'DTC incurs Rs 9 cr monthly loss due to congestion on roads'

NEW DELHI: The Delhi Transport Corporation (DTC) loses around 5,000 trips every day due to congestion and encroachments on roads, leading to a monthly loss of about Rs 9 crore.

The city's public transporter is under fire from different quarters over its depleting fleet of buses and operational inefficiency.

"We lose 5,000 of the scheduled 38,000 trips per day because our buses get stuck in traffic jams due to congestion and encroachments on the city roads," a senior DTC officer said.

The financially ailing transport body runs a fleet of around 3,800 buses in the national Capital. "The daily earnings of DTC come to around Rs 2.5 crore. We incur a loss of Rs 30 lakh per day due to the missed trips," the official said.

There are many roads in the city, where heavy encroachment forces the buses to crawl, and waste time and fuel, thus affecting the operational costs, he said.

"Most parts of Trans Yamuna like Shahdara, Silampur and border areas like Kapashera and Nangloi are heavily congested due to unauthorised encroachments," the official said.

The DTC is working on procurement of 1,000 more buses to boost its fleet. However, the authorities also need to work on the problem of encroachments on roads to make the buses run smoothly, he added.